A small walk from the bus stop, attempting to avoid the traffic on the wrong side, the asphalted pavement icy under a clear star speckled night. A quiet home to rest in after a long day, on the couch that has been my bed for the last night and will keep that function for at least one night more. If not for the void of Dutch but on my laptop screen one may not notice the difference with a Dutch student house. However, do not think that the language and it's accents used are a clear indication of the country of residence. Either the US, the UK or Germany could be the conclusion and at the university this is not any different. Only the rough mumbling of the bus and taxi drivers makes it clear you are in England, the London area more specifically and unmistakeably the birth place of Guy Ritchie.
Yesterday evening I made the journey across the Northern Sea. In the afternoon me and my parents left to go to the airport of Eindhoven. Not the nearest port, nor the biggest, but still the cheapest and most convenient, even with the layer of snow covering it. Just after notifying my British contact that all was fine time wise it was announced that the plane would have a delay of almost an hour. Luckily my planning was forgiving enough to still allow me to make it to the last coach from Stansted to Hatfield, where I was happy to see Amiy again, the person who was so hospitable to offer me this imperfect but very welcome place to sleep. And sleep I did well.
Luckily, because good sleep was what I needed to recharge after the journey and prepare for the day of today, themed 'back and forth'. Corridor D has been explored so many times it feels like I have been using it all my life. It started with my official enrollment into the university. I was a bit early, so I had to go to administration twice before they were ready for me. The process consisted of filling out information that I already supplied into a different system, double checking this information, some signing and stamping and it was concluded by taking a picture and supplying me with a shiny student pass, which proves I am now officially a student at the University of Hertfordshire!
But there the bureaucracy does not end. There is for instance the student account for online services and wireless internet that has to be arranged on the other side of campus and, not in the least, the question of housing. This couch will do for now, but I doubt multiple weeks on it will have a good impact on the quality of my sleep. So after some discussion during a couple of visits to the student center I managed to receive one more big bundle of paper which states that I will have a room on campus for half a year. Unfortunately I am not allowed to move in just yet, not even when I ask the current inhabitant nicely. The doors will not open for me until the 24th, so they supplied me with a list of people that offer temporary stay at their place to poor old hobos like me. So there is more arranging to do tomorrow.
Not that I was running out of things. I still need a bank account, for which I need a letter from the university, for which I first need the address of the bank I want to open an account with. Before I start traversing the list of phone numbers I need a British SIM card to prevent high phone bills. And then there is the situation with the computer especially bought for me and conveniently locked into the office of my supervisor, who is away for another week. This last fact makes the trouble of having to do all this stuff before actually being able to do work actually a good thing, because there isn't much research to do without discussing with my supervisor.
So off I go, to the sofa that looks like it is designed in the 70's and has been supporting buttocks continuously since then, but is still more than willing and able to receive my fatigue, to prepare for another day of Britonisation by dreaming of yet other lifes.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment